The automotive industry is undergoing rapid development fueled by innovations in the areas of computers, sensors and communications. New computer-based control systems are being deployed in vehicles to make them more efficient, safer and comfortable for drivers. These automotive systems are typically controlled by onboard control units.
For example, in order to comply with various government standards, the automotive control systems optimize working of the engines to ensure a more ecological exhaust without adversely effecting vehicle's power characteristics. For a more adaptive driving, the control systems of the gear boxes are optimized, adapting to the driving style, the road conditions and the weather conditions, by shifting the transmission more smoothly or less often, engaging the rear or front wheels, and changing the time of transfer of force between the wheel axles.
More complicated systems are being universally introduced, such as an automated parking system (based on sensors registering the distance between the vehicle and obstacles), a driving assistant program (such as recognition by a camera of the position of the vehicle in its traffic lane and on the road in general), and an emergency braking system (such as based on detecting obstacles by means of infrared sensors).
The systems of modern vehicles contain various control objects (the immediate mechanical parts of the vehicle, such as the engine or brakes), control units (electronic devices containing algorithms generating control commands), actuating devices (such as relays and simple units able to react to commands from a control unit) and measuring devices (usually sensors, able to transmit data to the control devices as to the state of the control objects).
Often all of the systems of an vehicle (and the electronic devices making up the systems) are connected to a common bus, and they exchange data with each other by means of that bus, which complicates the control algorithms of the vehicle even more.
Manufacturers provide drivers with possibilities of setting up or reconfiguring their vehicles, but often this requires special hardware and software. For example, by using the data bus of the vehicle it is possible to change the parameters of the firmware of the control unit of the vehicle or update the firmware entirely. Also, by connecting to the data bus of the vehicle, a driver himself can use a mobile telephone to view all errors contained in the memory of the control unit and make a decision as to the technical status of the vehicle. Thus, there is a trend toward simplifying the access to the various vehicle systems and there are technologies where a more traditional device for the user (such as a mobile telephone) is connected to the vehicle.
However, with simplified access, problems of security may arise, since hackers have new opportunities for connecting to the vehicle. Furthermore, along with the introduction of new systems, the overall safety of the vehicle declines. The vehicle becomes more complicated, it contains a multitude of control units, often the control units contain various components, and the development of the control algorithms is done by different groups of people in different environments. One cannot rule out mistakes or omissions, as well as various vulnerabilities. Given the fact that the control units are connected to a common data bus, a hacker who is connected to the bus can disable the control units or replace the control algorithms, which greatly decreases the safety of the driver when driving the vehicle.
Therefore, systems for improving the security of vehicle control systems are needed.